Last October, journeyman extraordinaire Travis Wiuff
got his hand raised against Bellator light heavyweight champion
Christian M’Pumbu but
left Yuma, Ariz., without a piece of gold. Non-title fights be
damned, Wiuff easily cleared the first hurdle on his road to a
Bellator title shot Friday night, smashing Chris Davis
in the first round of their light heavyweight tournament
quarterfinal.

Wiuff’s knockout win capped
Bellator 71 from the Casino Racetrack and Resort in Chester,
W.Va., the first of three events in the organization’s 2012 Summer
Series.

Rochester, Minn.’s Wiuff put Davis on the fence immediately and
sought a takedown, grinding away with short punches and knees.
However, when Davis tried to attack Wiuff’s leg partway through the
first period, “Diesel” got to work with punches on his turtled
opponent. Davis seemed to avoid most of the damage until one
crushing right flattened him, forcing referee Jason Herzog to
rescue him at 4:12 of the opening frame. The victory moves the
well-traveled Wiuff’s career mark to 67-14 with one No Contest.

K.
Mills

Vegh's left got it started.

Though Wiuff’s win over M’Pumbu makes him a tournament focal point,
the most impressive stoppage of the light heavyweight
quarterfinals, however, belonged to Slovakia’s Attila Vegh,
who needed only 60 seconds flat to blow away Croatian kickboxer
Zelg
Galesic.

Galesic, a Bellator middleweight tournament veteran, wanted a
striking match with the Slovak but clearly didn’t count on Vegh’s
counterpunching power. A massive left hook from Vegh put Galesic on
his knees, and “Pumukli” seized the opportunity. He was on
Galesic’s back in a heartbeat, squeezing the fight-ending
rear-naked choke and earning the victory in a cool minute.

The win, the sixth straight for the 26-year-old Vegh, ups his MMA
mark to 26-4-2 with 20 stoppages.

The enigmatic, often flaky Newton looked sharp from the onset,
shutting down Boughton’s lunging takedowns and punishing him. In
the second frame, Boughton’s desperation turned disaster as Newton
shucked him by and dove onto his back, locking up a rear-naked
choke. “The Hardcore Kid”, now 17-6-1 added his hooks and earned
the tap just 49 ticks into round two.

K.
Mills

Carpenter got crafty and used
the cage.

In the first of the four quarterfinals, tournament veteran Tim
Carpenter made the most of his late replacement opportunity by
tapping out Arizona’s Beau
Tribolet in the first round.

Carpenter, who was originally set for undercard action against
popular Midwestern fixture John Hawk, was
called into the tournament before Thursday’s weigh-ins when bracket
entrant Richard
Hale fell sick with flu-like symptoms.

The 31-year-old Carpenter, whose lone pro loss is to Bellator light
heayvweight champion Christian M’Pumbu, found his fight-ending
grace after a brief defensive lapse, as Tribolet rocked him and
ripped off a series of uppercuts that led to the concluding
scramble. After his first armbar attempt was rebuffed, the
Philadelphian used the cage for leverage and exploded into the
fight-ending armlock at 4:51 of the second round, moving to 8-1 in
his career.

The Bellator light heavyweight tournament will continue at Bellator 72 on July 20 from the USF Sun Dome in
Tampa, Fla. In the semifinals, Travis Wiuff will take on Tim
Carpenter while Attila Vegh and Emanuel Newton do battle with the
other spot in the finals on the line.

Brett Rogers Earns Much-Needed Win over Asplund in Bellator
Debut

In his first fight for Bellator, Strikeforce heavyweight veteran
Brett
Rogers got an anti-climactic but much-needed win over former
Ambition MMA teammate Kevin
Asplund, halting his fellow Minnesotan after the second
round.

K.
Mills

Rogers put an egg in Asplund's
left eye.

Rogers, 31, broke into the wider MMA consciousness in June 2009
when he knocked out former UFC heavyweight champion Andrei
Arlovski in just 22 seconds. Since that bout, Rogers was 1-4
with one No Contest, and was arrested and charged with domestic
violence last summer.

The contest was standard heavyweight fare, as Rogers threw Asplund
to the mat with a powerful lateral drop and pounded away for the
first round, before his pace predictably slowed, and he allowed
Asplund time on top in the second round. Before round two was out,
Rogers was again on top and doing damage to the left eye of
Asplund. The swelling “Da Grim” caused was enough for the ringside
physician to halt the contest after the second round.

The win was Rogers’ first since his October 2010 win over Ruben
Villareal and moved his career mark to 12-4-1. Asplund’s loss,
his first since his September 2002 pro MMA debut, drops him to
15-2.

In a bout co-promoted with Ohio’s
North American Allied Fight Series promotion, Josh
Stansbury took out Dan Spohn for
the NAAFS 205-pound title. Spohn was the aggressor early, but one
massive right hook from “The Sandman” left Spohn frozen on the
ground and easy fodder for a fight-ending guillotine. The East
Liverpool, Ohio, native earned the victory at 2:30 of the first and
avenged his November 2009 loss to Spohn, which also came by way of
guillotine.

In a stirring comeback, Dulles, Va.’s Neil
Johnson rallied in the second round of his featherweight scrap
with Brylan
Van Artsdalen. Johnson was hobbled by the Daddis Fight Team
rep’s leg kick attack early. However, a salvo of knees and punches
stunned van Artsdalen and allowed Johnson to dive on his back to
secure the fight-ending rear-naked choke in dramatic fashion at
4:29 of the second stanza.

Keith
Mills

Johnson's comeback was a real
eye-opener.

Hamlin, W.Va.’s Jason
Butcher cut Bellator veteran Duane
Bastress up on the mat in their middleweight affair. The
Jorge
Gurgel understudy rushed Bastress with strikes, happily went to
his back and locked up a triangle that with some slight adjusting
ended the bout just 63 seconds into the bout.

In a 190-pound catchweight affair, Youngtown, Ohio’s Kevin Zalac
overcame a fast start from Chris
Goldbaugh and chipped away with elbows to take three just
scorecards of 29-28.

A scheduled lightweight contest between unbeaten former Missouri
Tiger wrestler E.J. Brooks
and Joey
Bernard Holt was canceled. Brooks was involved in a car
accident on Wednesday and was suffering from concussion-like
symptoms while attempting to make weight Thursday, canceling the
bout.